Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Cry, Baby

Why is it, that on top of all the other discomforts and inconveniences of pregnancy - the heartburn, the back-ache, the farting (it's not just me, is it? It can't be), the disrupted sleep (what agent of Satan decided that pregnant women could not sleep on their backs? Side-sleeping is an unholy torture when the combination of belly weight and gravity constantly conspire to tip you over), the nauseau (more or less recovered from, but I still can't face a weird smell - and here I do not refer to my pregnancy farts, which are more noisy than smelly, but rather to things like, oh, say, peanut butter - without retching) - the forces of universe decided that one of the symptoms of hormonal unrest due to pregnancy should be extreme moodiness?

I don't want to cry about the fact that the cats scratched my brand-new rug, again, or about the play of light through my kitchen window, or about Ella Fitzgerald singing How High The Moon, or because I couldn't get the espresso machine to make me a decaf non-fat latte just by standing in front of it and yelling or because Britney Spear just keeps making things worse for herself. I don't want to cry, period. Crying gives me headaches, and if I get another headache right now it will probably just, you know, make me cry.

I also don't like being Her Bad Jekyll and Mother Hyde with my husband: I've been known, over recent days, to suddenly snap at him for, say, looking at me the wrong way or insisting upon making the gravy for the mashed potatoes or making puns that I don't get (although to be fair, I did laugh once I got it, like, two minutes later). He tolerates it, which only makes it worse, because his unquestioning acceptance of my psychotic condition just makes cry.

Feeling really fat while eating all the chocolates that a dear friend sent me also makes me cry (which, yes, I insist is a hormonal thing and not self-loathing, because most of the time I don't mind so much feeling fat, only, sometimes, when I'm eating handfuls of chocolates and getting a stomach-ache) but I keep doing it, because otherwise HBF would eat them and I would snap at him and then I would cry anyway, so I might as well skip the middleman and get the pleasure of the chocolate before I get weepy.

But the biggest headf*ck of all is that it's being really happy - which I am, these days - that has got me most constantly on the verge of tears. Feel Sprout kick? Eyes get wet. Listen to Wonderbaby sing ABC? Throat closes up. Watch HBF and Wonderbaby count the stars - which we can now see in abundance, outside the city - through her bedroom window? Choke back tears. Reflect upon my lovely family and my lovely life and the bright horizon that is constantly unfolding before us?

51 Comments:

I think it is human nature and there is not much use fighting against it. When we are so truly happy it touches our heart in a way that moves us which brings on the tears. I get bad headaches from crying too, even happy tears do it, which is certainly not fair!

Point # 2: I tore into hubby the other night for daring to try and cook up some veggies while I was wrestling with dinner. Because he was cooking the wrong ones. The ones I needed for something else. Oy.

At about 5 to 6 months (I'm now 7), this baby began rolling in exactly the wrong way so that, with no warning these loud, long, baritone sounds would be released from me. I had (and still have) zero control over it. It happened for the first time at, get this, the library.

Remember this... and then what about the invisible post where I explain that I was maudlin, torn, weepy because... Our family the enterprise meant such a major change for my life. My work would take a major hit and my identity from that work... I was (am?) sorry for me.

Only because I wanted it so bad. Loved to expand the family but recognize that it is very different from being those people with the baby.

A family for always and you are the centre it is overwhelming, it is sacrifice but it is worth it.

It's not the pregnancy -- it you. You are too smart. Just try to dumb up.

Pregnancy has brought on a bad infestation of Northern Ontario Barking Spiders (as they're called around here) in this house too. I knew for sure I was knocked up when I cried to crappy, sappy songs on the radio for no particular reason. Looks like the new digs are phenomenal. Hope you're settling in well.

I hear you.I'm a mess.My son told his daycare teacher that "mommy cries cause she has a baby in her." because he's so used to.I cried when I found a freckle on his back.And the OB appointments ... I can't get past the waiting room reading materials without some kleenex.But - it does beat barfing!

I stuff a pillow under my back on one side so that I'm still sort of sleeping on my back, but at an angle. Don't know if it's any better than just laying flat on my back, but that's what I'm doing so I might get an hour of sleep before I have to get up to pee.

And I cry a lot when I'm not pregnant. I'm surprised my husband doesn't leave me when I'm pregnant. He'd probably love a nice, long 40 week vacation from the moody being who used to be his wife.

I think I cried non-stop throughout all three of my pregnancies, when I wasn't completely freaking out about something. I was a really fun pregnant woman.It passes! Really. Someday, you'll get to be yourself again.

Hey, life is beautiful and deserves tears of happiness. Just don't go out and rent Friday Night Lights. Inspirational sports stories get me every time - I'm post partum, and I was weeping...at football of all thing. Their motto? "Clear Eyes. Full Hearts. Can't lose." It's a good motto. Makes me cry. More.

I call it the "second child syndrome". When I was pregnant with Bean, I cried more...I was more tired because his older brother still needed care no matter what, and I was definitely more moody (hubby denies that though...good for hubby!) because there is just so much more going on.

Like you when I saw Little Man do something I'd cry, when I felt Bean kick I'd cry too. I'd dream of the closeness I hoped they would share...and I would cry. (you get the point.)

When I was pregnant, I cried about everything. I thought it was so ridiculous, but my wise neighbor said, "Sometimes the soul needs to share the abundance of joy with the world. Each tear drop falls to the earth and the life inside of you is celebrated for an eternity."

Well you ARE carrying a brand-new person -- a real life -- in there - a privilege and adventure worthy of tears on its own (and probably hormonally consequential as well.) And you are facing a cosmic shift in the perfect Triad (that really set me into oceans of tears - so often. Especially when I heard the Rainbow Connection. What would it be like among the three of us when a new person showed up?) And do not forget that you are an exquisite writer with remarkable insight. ie Sensitive Artist. ie tearily-inclined. So I say enjoy it - you've earned every tear. Life is embracing you in emotionally enormous ways. Who wouldn't cry?

the crying at everything is the worst for me. I feel bad for DH and the kids b/c I am sooo grouchy and snap at them, but the crying seems to scare everyone more. Last night I wail and sobbed big fat tears because a cake I made stuck in the pan and came out in 9 million crumbly pieces. AFter I had gather myself back up and seemed to be doing ok, I started coughing really hard and peed myself a little.. then I cried about being incontinent.

I'm almost 13 weeks pregnant with my first. I cry at the Dog Whisperer; I have lost all ability to remember ANYthing; and the nausea? Not going anywhere - ask my Zofran AND Phenegren prescriptions. Egads.

Yet I, too, am happy as hell. Being a woman is tough. But man are we lucky.

I tend to cry much easier over touching, happy, or sentimental things, than things that others would think of as sad. And I'm not even pregnant. I'm either prone to completely lose my sh*t and scream, or to tear up during my children's more endearing moments. And it's worse right around ovulation, of course. Hormones be dam*ed!